Netflix Stock Rises On Rumors Of Amazon Acquisition
July 18, 2009 by tcgames · Leave a Comment
Stock in Netflix Inc. surged earlier this week on rumors that the online movie rental firm would be acquired by a tech giant like Amazon.com.
So far, the rumors have remained just that. But the speculation highlights how the Los Gatos firm that revolutionized the way people rent DVDs has emerged as a big player in an evolving world of Internet video.
Netflix’s strong suit is that it already has the technology, experience and distribution deals in place to stream movies and TV episodes, said analyst Tim Bajarin.
“One of the things (Hollywood) studios are coming to grips with is that DVD sales, especially through retail, are declining,” said Bajarin, principal analyst with Creative Strategies Inc. of Campbell. “The distribution of movies over the Internet is going to increase.”
Amazon and Netflix officials declined to comment on the rumors.
Bajarin also noted there was speculation that Microsoft or Google might make a better partner for Netflix, which has more than 10.3 million subscribers. They rent about 2.2 million DVDs each day online and receive them in the mail, bypassing retail outlets like the once-mighty Blockbuster.
Netflix offers more than 100,000 movies and TV episodes in standard or Blu-ray discs. But since 2007, it has also been expanding its catalog of 12,000 titles available for instant online viewing.
It has secured deals to stream content to a TV monitor hooked to a variety of Internet-connected devices, including Microsoft’s Xbox 360 game console, TiVo, a Roku video player and new Blu-ray players from Samsung and LG.
Netflix hasn’t announced how much streaming video it serves up.
However, Microsoft said in February that Netflix members streamed 1.5 billion minutes of content on the Xbox 360 in the first three months the service was available.
Last week, Netflix said Sony will make streaming available on Internet-ready Bravia TVs. Vizio will have similar models for…
Is Amazon Looking To Acquire Netflix?
July 15, 2009 by tcgames · Leave a Comment
Shares of Netflix stock rose five percent yesterday on indications that Amazon may be looking to acquire the popular movie rental service, according to the Memphis Business Journal.
The paper reported Netflix shares (NASDAQ: NFLX) closed at $42.19 on Monday, up 5.29 percent after trading as high as $42.40 earlier in the day.
Netflix stock has more than doubled since hitting a 52-week low of $17.90 on Oct. 27.
Seattle-based Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) offers its own video-on-demand service, which competes directly with Netflix’s online video streaming service.
Neither company would comment on the rumor.
On Slice of SciFi #219 we reported on how Netflix was looking to address the future of the video rental industry when their core business model of delivering DVDs through the mail begins to wane. Netflix was exploring ways to deliver more on-line content but one thing holding them back was licensing agreements with Hollywood studios. If this merger goes through, consumers could benefit from a greater selection of movies offered between Netflix and the Amazon Unbox service.
Netflix Streaming Available Through Sony BRAVIA TVs
July 10, 2009 by tcgames · Leave a Comment
Netflix has made the migration as the world’s largest online movie rental service to your living room by partnering with Sony Electronics to enable Netflix subscribers to instantly watch movies streamed from Netflix on Sony’s BRAVIA Internet Video-capable HDTVs. Those who own older BRAVIA models can also use it with Sony’s BRAVIA Internet video link module.
Starting from the fall, Netflix members who are on an unlimited plan will be able to use the Sony BRAVIA Internet Video-capable HDTVs, letting them watch over 12,000 movies and TV episodes streamed from Netflix. Netflix members will need to fork out a minimum of $8.99 monthly for unlimited streaming from their library.
Netflix Upgrade Coming This Fall To The Xbox 360
June 2, 2009 by tcgames · Leave a Comment
Here is an announcement from the Netflix blog. The upgrade sounds very cool and I’m looking forward to testing it out.
Hi, Catherine Fisher here from Netflix Corporate Communications. Microsoft swept E3 today with some exciting new ways to experience the Xbox 360. The news we are most excited about, of course, involves Netflix. Available this Fall, if you are an Xbox Gold LIVE member, you will be able to browse and add movies and TV episodes to your instant Queue directly from your Xbox 360 – you don’t have to go to your computer.
And with the announcement of Xbox LIVE Party, you will be able to simultaneously watch movies on your Xbox 360 with up to seven friends – bantering back and forth about what you are watching. More than one million Xbox LIVE Gold members have already enjoyed more than 1.5 billion minutes of movies and TV episodes via Netflix since November 2008, and we hope you are as excited about the new ways to enjoy movies and TV episodes from Netflix on your Xbox 360 as we are.
Mobile Manager For Netflix Puts Your Movie Queue On Your Phone
April 16, 2009 by tcgames · Leave a Comment
Windows Mobile only: There’s no shortage of Netflix applications for popular mobile platforms like the iPhone or Android, but Microsoft has just released a really nice looking Netflix Mobile application complete with streaming movie previews.
Apart from the preview feature—which does set Netflix Mobile apart from its other mobile counterparts—this app handles most of the common features you’d expect, like queue management, search, listings, and ratings.
Mobile Netflix Mobile is a free download, Windows Mobile only—at least for a limited time, according to the download page. Thanks Louis!
Price Increase For Blu-ray Movies On Netflix
March 31, 2009 by tcgames · 2 Comments
This appeared on the Netflix Blog this morning…
Hi, Jessie Becker here, VP of Marketing, with a message for our members who have added Blu-ray access to their accounts. This message does not apply to you if you have not added Blu-ray access to your account.
The number of titles available for us to purchase on Blu-ray has increased significantly. Our Blu-ray selection has grown more than 60% in just 6 months to over 1,300 titles, and is continuing to expand quickly. Blu-ray adoption among our members has also grown – it’s now close to 10%. As we buy more, you are able to choose from a rapidly expanding selection of Blu-ray titles. And as you’ve probably heard, Blu-ray discs are substantially more expensive than standard definition DVDs – often as much as 30% more.
We’re committed to providing a high quality Blu-ray experience for our members who choose to add Blu-ray access, and in order to do that we need to adjust Blu-ray pricing. As a result, the monthly charge for Blu-ray access is increasing for most plans and will now vary by plan.
If you have added Blu-ray access to your account, this change will take effect on your next billing date on or after April 27, 2009. You will also receive an email from us letting you know the monthly charge for your plan. (Members who do not have Blu-ray access today and add it to their account in the future will see the new prices as of today.)
To avoid any confusion, here are the charges for each of the plans.
Netflix Launches New Personalization Features
March 27, 2009 by tcgames · Leave a Comment
Netflix has posted an update to their online streaming service. The competition is heating up, and Netflix looks like it’s still a serious contender for online streaming content. With the news that BlockBuster is entering the on demand market, this competition is always beneficial for the end user.
The features include:
Taste Preferences: The ability to set taste preferences across a variety of moods (e.g. feel-good, dark, goofy, gritty, etc.); storylines (e.g. courtroom, dinosaurs, mid-life crisis, etc.); qualities (e.g. critically-acclaimed, visually-striking, etc.); and other category types, on a new, easier, three button system.
Some of the rows will be based on what the member explicitly sets. Others will be based on a member’s recent activity.
Please comment on what you find helpful and suggest possible areas of improvement so we can continue to take personalized movie discovery to the next level for you.
Netflix’s Chief Product Officer Speaks About Streaming Issues
March 21, 2009 by tcgames · Leave a Comment
This was just posted on the Netflix Blog….
This is Neil Hunt, Chief Product Officer at Netflix.
There’s been some blog swirl about Netflix streaming delivery, and I’d like to explain what we are doing to improve our streaming delivery. Our aspiration is to deliver to everyone the best bitrate that their broadband connection can support.
Congestion Could Affect Some Users, But Not Others, at Some Times, but Not Always
Content from Netflix originates on CDN servers that are distributed around the US (just as our DVD shipping centers are) so that the data doesn’t have to traverse the Internet backbones to get to our customers, but instead can usually reach its destination via regional and metro networks that have much higher aggregate bandwidth. This means that if there is any congestion and slowdown, it will be different in different regions (by Internet topology, which isn’t completely tied to geography). Hence some customers may be affected, while others are not. Also, routing to different ISPs in the same region may be quite different, thus performance may also be quite different, even for neighbors, if they are connected to different ISPs. Moreover, congesting points can rise and fall with ISP configuration changes and other conditions.
Different Content, Different Devices, Different Characteristics
Finally, different titles, and different encodes for different playback device types, may come from different CDNs or different servers at a particular CDN, so may have different paths and different bottlenecks. Accordingly, customers may see better performance on Xbox than their PC, or vice-versa. Equivalently, some titles may stream unaffected, while others suffer congestion. There is no purposeful discrimination between different clients – we want them all to perform very well.
Getting to More Consistent Delivery by Routing Around the Problems Read more
‘Queued’ Is a Fantastic Front End to Netflix [Downloads]
February 18, 2009 by tcgames · Leave a Comment
Windows/Mac/Linux: Free application Queued is a desktop application that manages your Netflix queue, whether you’re online or not.
Why would you need a desktop browser for Netflix, you ask? Well, you don’t need one, really. Netflix has a pretty good web site, but that doesn’t mean it couldn’t be better. Queued has an attractive, snappy interface. It’s fast, it’s well laid out, and it even works when you’re not connected to the internet—so you can reorder, add new movies, or browse your queue whether or not you’re online. It achieves this little piece of functionality by downloading and saving every piece of data it can while you’re browsing online—so it saves movie posters, descriptions, search results, and more.
Netflix Considers HBO Streaming Downloads
Netflix (NSDQ: NFLX) has reportedly sent a survey to customers asking if they would be willing to pay an additional $10 a month to watch HBO movies and shows online.
In the survey, posted on the blog Hacking Netflix, the movie rental service asks subscribers if they would be willing to pay to have HBO content streamed to their computers or to an Internet-connected device attached to their digital TVs. Such devices could include the Netflix Player built by Roku, Microsoft’s Xbox 360 video-game console, a TiVo digital video recorder, or select Blu-ray disk player from LG Electronics and Samsung.
In addition to the HBO content, subscribers would still have access to the 12,000 movies and TV episodes Netflix currently offers online at no additional charge. HBO shows that could be made available include The Wire, Entourage, and Big Love, and movies such as Jumper, Gladiator, and I Am Legend.
Netflix, along with rival Blockbuster, has been expanding its offerings online and has been signing deals with consumer electronics manufacturers to supporter their services in devices.
Blockbuster last month announced a partnership with Sonic Solutions in which the movie-rental company would use Sonic’s content-delivery system to offer movie downloads to Apple Macs and Windows PCs, portable media players, Blu-ray disc players, personal video recorders, set-top boxes, mobile phones, and Web-connected TVs.
Blockbuster plans to market the service online and through its retail stores, where the company also plans to sell some of the supporting devices. Blockbuster has more than 7,500 stores worldwide. Blockbuster and Sonic said they’re working with a host of consumer electronics manufacturers, but did not say who they are.
The overall online video market is expected to grow from $1.2 billion this year to $4.5 billion by 2012, according to analyst firm In-Stat. How much of that will be online movie rentals is unclear. The same In-Stat study found that more than half of U.S. consumers still favor purchasing physical disks when they buy movies or TV shows.
Source: TechWeb
